Free software skype alternative?
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Does anyone know of a free software alternative to Skype?
There is quite some choice! However, to the best of my knowledge Skype "cannot" communicate with any of them. Well, "does not want" would be more correct because it refuses the open standards so that their users are captive and their competitors have a hard time.
Notice that Epiphany is part of the default install of Trisquel. Ekiga and Linphone are other popular options.
Hi,
I see that some of those programs have no encryption, including Ekiga. How important do you think encryption is in these programs?
cheers
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Yeah, Skype is a bitch to avoid... I'm trying to convince a friend into using Ekiga, but he sees no point in it, since Skype gives him all the functions he needs.
I am a translator!
That's the dilemma with Free Software adoption. It's not enough that the software costs nothing and is (in so many cases) just as functional as the proprietary counterpart. Because human beings are creatures of habit, most of us will tend to stick with what we've grown accustomed to even if a better alternative is made easily available. Ogg Vorbis has been around for years, is a fully open standard, technically superior to .mp3 in every way, yet many people don't even know it exists, and far fewer use it.
With Skype, the problem is even worse, because it's a "social" (in reality anti-social) application, so people want to use what everyone else is using. The problem is compounded by Skype actively preventing its users from communicating with other software and other protocols. It's disgusting monopolization.
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Exactly, monopolization through any means necessary has nothing to do with a free market. The sooner people will understand that, the sooner free software movements will pop out of the ground like mushrooms after rain. Can you give me a hand with setting Ekiga up in this thread? I'm having some strange issue that seems to be Trisquel specific.
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Having never used Ekiga, your helper will have to be someone else. ;)
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Well, what would you recommend instead of Ekiga? Twinkle and Empathy can't connect to my sip account on ekiga.net, at all. I assume Ekiga only acts as if it connects, but has some issue with "connectivity" as well, thus no sound output.
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Awesome, Skype's servers are down right now. This will make a nice argument when talking people into alternative software : D
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Not to be the party pooper, but isn't Ekiga's server at least as likely to experience downtime as Skype's?
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That was supposed to be a joke, partly...
Sure ekiga.net can go down, but I thought Ekiga can connect to different servers, as long they support sip and that other thing Ekiga runs on (h.something)? Given you have registered an account there, of course.
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